USS New York
With a year to go before it even touches the water, the Navy's
amphibious assault ship USS New York has already made history. It was
built with 24 tons of scrap steel from the World Trade Center
USS New York is about 45 percent complete and should be ready for launch
in mid-2007. Katrina disrupted construction when it pounded the Gulf
Coast last summer, but the 684-foot vessel escaped serious damage, and
workers were back at the yard near New Orleans two weeks after the
storm.
It is the fifth in a new class of warship - designed for missions that
include special operations against terrorists. It will carry a crew of
360 sailors and 700 combat-ready Marines to be delivered ashore by
helicopters and assault craft.
"It would be fitting if the first mission this ship would go on is to
make sure that bin Laden is taken out, his terrorist organization is
taken out," said Glenn Clement, a paint foreman. "He came in through the
back door and knocked our towers down and (the New York ) is coming right
through the front door, and we want them to know that."
Steel from the World Trade Center was melted down in a foundry in Amite,
La., to cast the ship's bow section. When it was poured into the molds
on Sept. 9, 2003, "those big rough steelworkers treated it with total
reverence," recalled Navy Capt. Kevin Wensing, who was there. "It was a
spiritual moment for everybody there."
Junior Chavers, foundry operations manager, said that when the
trade center steel first arrived, he touched it with his hand and the
"hair on my neck stood up." "It had a big meaning to it for all of us,"
he said. "They knocked us down. They can't keep us down. We're going to
be back."
The ship's motto? - 'Never Forget'
